Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various telecommunication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, and broadcasts. Typical wireless communication systems may employ multiple-access technologies capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing available system resources (e.g., bandwidth, transmit power). Examples of such multiple-access technologies include code division multiple access (CDMA) systems, time division multiple access (TDMA) systems, frequency division multiple access (FDMA) systems, orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) systems, single-carrier frequency divisional multiple access (SC-FDMA) systems, and time division synchronous code division multiple access (TD-SCDMA) systems.
These multiple access technologies have been adopted in various telecommunication standards to provide a common protocol that enables different wireless devices to communicate on a municipal, national, regional, and even global level. An example of an emerging telecommunication standard is Long Term Evolution (LTE). LTE is a set of enhancements to the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) mobile standard promulgated by Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). It is designed to better support mobile broadband Internet access by improving spectral efficiency, lower costs, improve services, make use of new spectrum, and better integrate with other open standards using OFDMA on the downlink (DL), SC-FDMA on the uplink (UL), and multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna technology. Other access technologies can include Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), and/or derivatives thereof.
In some systems, when a device establishes a radio connection with a network, the device can be configured with parameters such as a power control preamble, signaling radio bearer delay, etc. for performing power control over the radio connection over a period of time. These parameters may be configured based on properties of the cell, distance or pathloss of the device to a base station providing the cell, etc. The devices abide by these parameters in subsequent transmissions to synchronize power in the network over the connection. Where a device communicating in a cell over a primary carrier configures a secondary carrier with the cell, the device may already be nearly synchronized with the cell based on a previous power control procedure when establishing the primary carrier. The device, however, is still required to abide by the power control parameters to synchronize the secondary carrier with the network as well. When devices frequently activate/deactivate secondary carriers and/or activate secondary carriers (e.g., to communicate a small payload of data, which can be based on considerations at the device such as data load at the device), this can cause burdensome delay.